By David DeKunder :
October 9, 2012
: Updated: October 11, 2012 9:39am

The "dibbuk haunted" wine cabinet that inspired the movie "Possession."

A former Clemens High School graduate's experience owning a religious — and some say possessed — object has made its way to Hollywood.

Jason Haxton, a 1976 Clemens graduate, had been inundated with calls and messages since “The Possession” — a movie based on his experiences, which he later captured in a book titled “The Dibbuk Box” — opened in theaters in late August.

The movie, which stars Kyra Sedgwick, has topped $50 million at the box office since its release.

Haxton, a resident of Kirksville, Mo., wrote his book to tell his eight-year story concerning his interesting and bizarre experiences owning a “supernatural object” he purchased on eBay. He also tells the stories and experiences of other people who owned the Dibbuk box before he came in possession of it.

“It is one story with many, many people involved,” said the 54-year-old Haxton. “It is the best of the paranormal world you can say.”

In Jewish folklore, a Dibbuk box is a wine cabinet which is believed to be inhabited by a dybbuk, a restless or malicious spirit that can possess or haunt the living.

The box contains several items used to exorcise demons, including a small statue engraved with the Hebrew word “shalom,” a golden goblet and one dried rose bud.

Haxton, who is director of a medical history museum in Kirksville, became aware of the Dibbuk box in 2004 during a staff meeting. A student intern from nearby Truman State University mentioned that his roommate had purchased a haunted box.

“Everyone around the table said, ‘Oh, that's something new,'” said Haxton about the museum's staff reaction. “That kind of stopped the conversation. We said if you get a chance come bring it by.”

Instead the owner of the box decided to put it up for sale on eBay. Haxton purchased the object and, once he had it in his possession, he began to experience numerous ailments, including a stabbing pain the moment he touched opened the box.

“I woke up the next day and my eyes looked like someone had gouged me and looked bloody,” he said. “I noticed it right away. I didn't think (much) about it but after several weeks there was no change. I started choking, started getting hives and a strange taste I never had in my mouth (before).”

Other ailments included coughing up blood and welts that would appear from head to toe and then disappear. Also he smelled aromas of cat urine and jasmine flower when he or his family was around the box, the same smells other owners of the box experienced.

When he began experiencing these ailments, Haxton said he thought the Dibbuk box may have been contaminated. However, tests conducted on the box were negative for any chemical or bio-hazard contamination.

Since he couldn't find any evidence of contamination to the box, Haxton said he began to question if the box had a spiritual attachment to it. He began talking to Jewish rabbis, who suggested that the box be placed in a 24 karat gold-lined acacia wood ark, the same materials used to construct the Ark of the Covenant in the Bible.

“The rabbis said line it in gold because God loves gold,” Haxton said.

Once the Dibbuk box was placed in the wood ark, Haxton said he stopped having problems with it and his health improved.

When “The Possession” came out this summer, Haxton decided to bury the box in an undisclosed location.

Haxton, who was a production consultant for the movie, said he has no regrets on how things turned out. But he said he wants to go back to living a normal life with his wife, Lori, and their two college-age children. He said writing his book, which he described as a “catharsis,” was the first step in doing that.

“It's like my life has moved on,” he said. “I got other things going on. It was an interesting part of my life and journey.

”In hindsight I wouldn't do anything differently because things have worked well. My health seams to be fine, my family seems to be fine and I had an interesting experience to boot,” he added.